Only higher taxes on the rich will save us from riots in the street

Is the strategy now to scare folks into supporting higher taxes, because I've seen a lot of this kind of rhetoric lately?

NYC Mayor Mike Bloomberg:

“You have a lot of kids graduating college can’t find jobs,” he said in response to a question about the poverty rate. “That’s what happened in Cairo. That’s what happened in Madrid,” he continued, referring to the uprising that overthrew President Hosni Mubarak of Egypt and the more recent protests against the Spanish government’s austerity measures. “You don’t want those kinds of riots here.”

You were safe in your factory because of police-forces and fire-forces that the rest of us paid for. You didn’t have to worry that marauding bands would come and seize everything at your factory — and hire someone to protect against this — because of the work the rest of us did.

You do not - and I mean not - ever want the poor to reach that level of self-awareness. Because if they do, they won't use mainstream, politically polite methods of gaining control. They'll use the methods they know. Guns. Violence. Rage.

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Zbigniew Brzezinski on Morning Joe (no link):

I think Warren Buffett wrote an historic piece, which ought to be the guide for Congress.

We can non have a society in which 1% owns so much and which the remnants, of what used to be the poor in our society, now increased by refugees from a failing lower middle class are deprived.

This is a prescription for social conflict, in addition to economic paralysis.

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Is this really where we are, or is this just rhetoric?

And, what does it say about liberal elites and their opinion of the "poor", if they think the "poor" are on the verge of riots?

To me, it's incredibly condescending. It calls their values into question and is borderline racist.

Hasn't that always been a talking point? That's one of the basic assumptions of the social contract: That we don't want to reach a point where the people who don't have just up and take from the people who do.

Hasn't that always been a talking point? That's one of the basic assumptions of the social contract: That we don't want to reach a point where the people who don't have just up and take from the people who do.

Hasn't that always been a talking point? That's one of the basic assumptions of the social contract: That we don't want to reach a point where the people who don't have just up and take from the people who do.

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No, we don't. Look around. In other countries, the boiling point is far lower.

You saw consistent, broad hints of it here, in the early '30s, with 25% UEP.

Hasn't that always been a talking point? That's one of the basic assumptions of the social contract: That we don't want to reach a point where the people who don't have just up and take from the people who do.

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And we're close to a tipping point now? Really?

Give me a break. It's total BS.

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No, we're not at a tipping point. But taxes aren't robbing people of incentive to work, either. It's natural for rhetoric to be pushed to the extremes.

Scarborough was talking about this a little bit this morning, indirectly. He thinks - and it's probably at least somewhat true - that we won't necessarily reach that tipping point because Americans still think that they can join the wealthy if they work hard. Or, if they can't, their children can.

The Welfare System was established to by the rich to keep the poor happy and content. We are not there yet, but keep pissing on the poor, and you might not like what you see.

Take away health care, jobs and food from these people, and something will happen. I'm not saying a civil war, but this will not be a nice place to live or everyone but 5% of all Americans (those with enough money to protect themselves). Hell, we have already started down the path.

I would be worried about those without forcefully taking from those who have something. Drugs make people do this, but it would be a shame if the greed of a few did it as well. If your children are starving, what are you going to do?

Probably around the same time the Republican governors received the memo to declare war on private-sector unions and blame them for all the financial troubles Wall Street caused. Their declaration of war on those of color and those in poverty strikes me as condescending and racist.